


Boys and Baseball

by captainofelos



Category: High School Musical: The Musical: The Series (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Fluff and Angst, gina is a university student, ricky is a professional baseball player
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:43:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26531581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainofelos/pseuds/captainofelos
Summary: LA Dodger Ricky Bowen and dance teacher/student Gina Porter meet at a party and become frenemies, until the day that Ricky needs a fake girlfriend to impress his friends and teammates and Gina needs to move on from her ex-boyfriend
Relationships: Big Red & Ricky Bowen (HSMTMTS), Gina Porter & Nini Salazar-Roberts, Ricky Bowen & E.J. Caswell, Ricky Bowen/Gina Porter
Comments: 1
Kudos: 12





	1. Part 1

“C'mon Gina don’t be such a loser,” Gina muttered to herself as she looked into the mirror of Dodger Stadium. She needed a minute away from all the fans and baseball players but she also was waiting for a boy to come find her. She was seeing this boy named Carter for about a month. But she wanted more than just seeing. She wanted a relationship, and she thought Carter did too. He asked her to come with him to the Dodger gala, so she thinks tonight's the night they officially start dating.

At least that’s what Gina thought before stepping into the stadium. She leaves the washroom and looks at her phone for the time. She had no missed calls from Carter. She bit her lip trying to convince herself that he was just busy. She can feel the music from the speakers shake the floor, vibrating against the bottom of her heels. Carter was probably busy, right?

As Gina takes a deep breath and runs her fingers through her curls, giving herself positive affirmations that Carter was just busy, she makes her way back onto the field. She puts her phone back into her clutch and walks down the aisles to the field. The stadium had dim lighting making it hard for Gina to see where she was going.

Gina makes her way through the crowd of people, she could feel alcohol on the bottom of her shoes. As she looks for Carter, she passes a girl who is doing shots of vodka. Gina looks over her shoulder and stares at the girl, slightly judging and as she’s staring she almost bumps into someone.

“Fuck, sorry!” Gina apologizes even though it was the boy’s cup that spilled all over her red dress.

“It’s cool, the drink sucked anyways.” The boy laughs as he checks the cup to see if there was any more alcohol in it.

Gina looks up, squinting a little bit because the stadium is semi dark and tries to figure out who the boy is. He was wearing a maroon suit with a paisley button up underneath. The boy meanwhile was looking Gina up and down focused on the dark stain covering the top half of her chest. As he laughs at his mess, Gina walks by him to exit the stadium and get a breath of fresh air.

Once she leaves the stadium, she walks by the sign that says “ _ Welcome to Dodger Stadium _ .” She stands beside it and finally gets to look at the mess on her dress. She licks her thumb and presses it on the dress trying to remove the stain but she only makes it worse.

“Hey..I’m so sorry about earlier.” The voice from before said to Gina, which makes her turn around to face the boy who spilt on her dress.

“It’s okay, I shouldn’t have worn this dress anyway.” Gina mutters, giving up on fixing the stain.

The boy was a little drunk, but he was still sober enough to remember what was going on.

“I’m Ricky.” He said, extending his hand toward Gina.

Ricky. It fit him and his look. Now that she could see his face, he looked familiar.

“Gina.” She nods, shaking Ricky’s hand.

Ricky smiles and licks his lips. He was shocked he never saw Gina at a Dodger event before. He was used to seeing people at fan events, sitting in seats at games and reporters and social media interns with camera crews. Ricky wanted to pinch himself for sounding so snobbish in his head, but he focused on Gina and was trying to make sure his vision wasn’t blurry or the outdoor lighting made Gina’s skin look nice.

“You, uh, look familiar. Have we met?” Gina asks,bewilderment written all over her face.

“Not that I know of.” Ricky responds laughing.

“Oh.” Gina purses her lips together, in an attempt to stop the giggle that was trying to escape.

“It’s just you look familiar, like someone I’ve seen on TV or something like that?”

“I uh...play for the Dodgers. I’m one of the outfielders. I hope to play more this year, if Cody gets injured or traded.” Ricky shrugs and Gina raises her eyebrows, intrigue written all over her face.

“Oh...cool.”

Gina still knew nothing about Ricky. She didn’t know what number he wore, what his stats were last year and didn’t even know teams had backup outfielders.

“Do you know Carter? Carter Mccleod?”

  
  


The reason Gina brought up Carter was because she hoped it would switch the conversation. That and she was curious to know where Carter was in the stadium.

“Yeah, he has brown hair, green eyes, his dad is the general manager? yeah , he’s a fun guy.” Ricky rambles, only speaking from what’s heard from his teammates Cody, Bo and Joc.

“He is a fun guy.” Gina agrees, and she starts to think of Carter’s dreamy green eyes.

Ricky laughs,“Are you guys dating?”

“Uhm...No we aren’t.” Gina says, disappointment laced in her voice because she thought tonight was the night Carter would ask her out.

Ricky grins as the alcohol in his system starts to kick in. He takes a step closer to Gina who just raises her eyebrow in confusion. She crosses her arms over her chest.

“Do...you want to go somewhere else?” He asks, his brown eyes shining.

Gina is shocked at his question. She wishes she didn’t have such high standards for random strangers who look like nice guys.

Gina’s cheeks flush and she lets out a small laugh and Ricky thinks he sounded smoother than he really did.

“I’m okay asshole..” Gina snarls and turns around and goes back into Dodger Stadium.

Ricky watched as Gina walked away, running his fingers through his curly hair. He let out a deep breath and stood beside the Welcome sign looking up at the sky which was filled with stars.

“Ricky, where the hell did you go?” One of his teammates, Christian asked as he walked up and stood beside Ricky.

“Who was that?” Christian asked.

“Just...a girl.”

Ricky didn’t want to explain the situation to Christian. Anytime someone mentioned a girl there were usually rumors. To Ricky she was a stranger who rejected him and he didn’t want Gina to be even more mad.

“Cmon Ricky let’s go back, apparently Belli wants to talk to you.”

Gina found herself back inside Dodger stadium trying to find Carter. The stadium halls were suddenly crowded with people trying to leave for the night, and it made it hard to navigate through. When Gina made it through the crowd she accidentally slipped on some steps but caught herself before people could see.

When she lifted her head and shoulders, she looked around the area for the closest exit, but instead of finding an exit her eyes landed on something she didn’t expect. Carter. His tongue pressing against a blonde’s and his arms around her waist while her hands, bright pink nails, in his soft hair. 

At that moment, the world seemed to stop around Gina. The air in her lungs stopped, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up, chills ran down her spine and her heart felt like it was breaking. This is what having your heartbroken felt like-cold and unexpected.

She realized how long she was staring at them, watching them continue to lock lips and not care. She practically ran outside. She was breathing heavy and trying to keep up with how fast her heart was beating while tears burned her eyes.

When Gina finally made it outside, she took a massive breath as if to get rid of all the oxygen she inhaled from inside Dodger Stadium. After a few seconds she pulls out her phone and calls Nini to come pick her up. She looks for a safe place to wait where Nini could see her. It was very quiet at night, almost peaceful, as if no one else existed, especially after what Gina just saw.

After waiting for a few minutes, sulking and crying, headlights beamed on Gina and her best friend Nini, parked her car. Gina opens the passenger door, slides into the seat and slams the door shut. Nini could see the mascara tracks on her face as Gina buckled up.

“Thanks, Neens.” Gina sniffles, not looking at Nini.

“It’s nothing. You okay?” Nini asked, shifting her car into drive but still looking at Gina.

“I will be. Can we just go home please?” Gina deflects, not ready to tell Nini what happened.

On the drive to your apartment, Gina stared out the window, completely and utterly exhausted. Gina wasn’t sure if her head was pounding because of the music that was played all evening or her crying for fifteen minutes straight. She wasn’t even sure what to do or think or even say, it’s not like her and Carter were actually dating.

It was only 12:30AM when the two girls arrived home. Gina tosses her purse on the counter and heads straight into her bedroom. Nini watches Gina walk like a zombie into her room and decides to let her mope until the morning. She knew what Carter’s intentions were and felt guilty that she didn’t tell Gina, but Nini was too nice and Gina seemed happy, so Nini stayed quiet.

Once Gina is in her room she falls onto her messy bed and looks up at the ceiling. She thought the silence would be more comforting than the DJ’s music. 

She wipes the back of her hand across her eyes and she can feel the dried mascara on her eyelids. She knew she should get out of bed and wipe off her makeup, but her eyes were too heavy and she was exhausted.

Before Gina even realized she fell asleep, morning arrived and she was woken up by the sun peering into her room. She usually loved waking up in the mornings to the sound of birds chirping and the smell of bacon being cooked in the kitchen. But this morning these two things were not great to wake up too because Gina was dealing with a dehydration headache. 

After contemplating getting out of bed, Gina rolls off her bed and tries to find her balance. Once Gina made her way into the kitchen, Nini turned around and noticed that Gina was still wearing her clothes and makeup from last night.

“Morning Gi.” Nini flashes Gina a big smile.

“Morning Neens...” Gina grumbles as she walks to the kitchen table.

Nini’s dark brown eyes locked with Gina’s, watching Gina lazily pour coffee into her mug that ironically said “a cup of sunshine” on it. When Gina looked up she could see Nini giving her a caring look.

“What Neens?” Gina asks, playing dumb.

“What happened last night?” 

Gina groans, reliving the moment last night that broke her heart.

“Nothing.” 

Gina sits down in the chair beside Nini and brings her knees into her chest. 

“Okay. Then how was the Gala?” Nini asks, trying to get Gina to spill.

“It was okay.” Gina huffs and brings her coffee mug towards her mouth, blowing on her hot coffee to try and cool it.

“What happened with him?”

“Him who?”

“Carter.”

Gina’s jaw clenches at the sound of Carter’s name, but she quickly switches to biting her bottom lip to not let Nini know.

“I don’t know, probably something happened with his dad.” Gina lies.

“Gi, I’m so sorry.” Nini’s face is sympathetic, she thought Gina only went to the gala for Carter.

“It’s fine, the gala was lame and I couldn’t find Carter so I called you for a ride home.” Gina lies.

Nini laughs. “I’m always down to be your Uber driver.”

Gina’s lips form a small smile and she tries to take a sip of her coffee. The two girls sit in silence for a few minutes while they eat and drink.

Gina decides to go and get some food from the fridge, and after she grabs some strawberries and closes the fridge door, she notices the calendar hanging on the door. Her eyes scan over the calendar and they fall towards the date March 15th. It had the words RENT DUE written in all caps and she realized that she had two weeks to collect the rest of her rent money.

“Crap.” Gina yells, loud enough for Nini to hear.

“What?”

“I forgot about rent being due.” Gina can almost feel her life spiraling downwards.

She was so busy with Carter that she forgot all about paying her rent. She stopped teaching at the dance studio because she was always with him.

“Gi, it’s fine, you can pay your half later.”

“No Neens, I can get the money.”

Another lie. She needed at least $100, but if she taught a few dance classes everyday for the next two weeks, she could get enough money to pay her half on time.

Gina takes a deep breath and calls her dance studio, and is ready to beg for her job back if she has to. And after talking with her studio head for a half hour, she not only had her job back but was teaching in a few hours.

Ricky meanwhile was at his loft that he rented from E.J. Caswell waking up from the previous night, when he got a text message from Joc Pederson.

_ Bowie you have a car right? _ __  
  


_ Yea, why? _

_ Great, Jess and I have some stuff to do and since you still owe Cody for stealing his drink last night, you get to take Tessa to dance class today. _

_ Do i have a choice? _

_ Not really, it’s either dance or cleaning Cody’s equipment. Her class starts at 3, be here by 2:30 at the latest. _

3 o’clock rolls by and Gina is ready to teach for the first time in what feels like forever. She is teaching the 3-4 ballet class. She is in the studio waiting for her students to arrive. 

Ricky was running late picking up Tessa and barely got to the studio on time. Once he is parked, the little girl jumps out of his car, and grabs his hand and runs him into the studio. When the two of them enter the dance studio, Tessa forces him to sit down and wait until her class is over. When Ricky walks into the room, his eyes meet Ginas. 

“Fuck.” Ricky whispers, hoping the little kids didn’t hear him.

It was the girl from the Gala, the one who rejected him.

Ricky wasn’t angry at Gina but rather he was embarrassed because he acted like an idiot the previous night. When Gina figured out why the boy looked familiar she kept her cool. Part of her wanted to laugh because of course the universe would throw this at her, but the other part didn’t care because she knew he was kinda drunk and she was already annoyed.

After she starts the kids on stretches, she walks over to where Ricky is sitting.

“Hey,” He laughs

“Hi.” She grins.

“I kinda owe you an apology for the other night.”

Gina raises her eyebrow, confused as to why he was apologizing.

“I’m sorry for everything I did at the Gala. I didn’t mean to ask you out..Especially considering you told me about Carter and all...”

Gina laughs in response. “You don’t need to apologize, you were drunk, I get it.”

Gina was kinda shocked at how nice and relaxed Ricky was.

Ricky was relieved. “So you don’t think I’m an asshole?”

“I didn’t say that. Just that you didn’t need to apologize.” She jokes and he laughs. Gina found herself liking Ricky’s laugh, it was really soft and sweet.

“Okay, let me re-introduce myself...I’m Ricky.” He puts out his hand, the same way he did at the Gala.

“Gina.” She shakes it again, holding his hand for a second before letting go.

“I won’t forget it this time.” He jokes and Gina giggles, before turning around to start teaching her class.


	2. Part 2

Was she too clingy with Carter? Did she say something wrong? Maybe he was just busy with school and studying. They cuddled the other night. Gina thought her relationship with Carter was doing great...if it was a relationship? Her brain was full of thought. Worrying and waiting.

“Hey, Gina!”

Gina’s eyes widen and she raises her eyebrows, looking up from her phone to see Ricky standing in the doorway of the empty studio. He laughs at the fact that he caught her off guard and he didn’t notice that she completely ignored his question because she wasn’t listening. Everything around her was no longer important, she was too busy thinking about the mess she caused with Carter.

“I can go, Tessa probably wants to leave.” Ricky says, a grin creeping onto his face.

“Sorry, I’ve been a little distracted.” Gina apologizes and rubs her hands over her face.

Ricky shrugs. “Penny for your thoughts?”

“It’s no big deal...Actually..” Gina trails and Ricky looks up at her.

“Technically... if you went on a few dates with a girl...and you thought you had fun...How long would you wait to text them?” Gina awkwardly, she knew that she wasn’t being subtle and she can feel all the heat rising to her cheeks.

Ricky smirks. “Technically is he a good guy or a bad guy?”

“Depends.”

“Well...” Ricky puts his hands inside his jean pockets and looks downwards for a moment before looking up and directly into Gina’s eyes.

“A good guy is probably just doing his homework and is too busy for a serious relationship,...But if it’s the bad guy, then he’s too busy being with other people.” Ricky answers honestly, even though he knew it would hurt Gina.

Gina lets out a dry laugh. “God I’m so stupid.”

Ricky sighs and he moves closer to Gina who is now leaning on the mirror with her head in her hands. He watches as she lifts her head and gives him a fake smile. She wishes she would get mad at herself for not trusting her gut feeling about Carter but it was too late.

“This is just all technical, right?” Ricky asks, semi-joking.

“Yea totally technical, sorry.”

“Hey, what happened to the girl who called me an asshole at the gala?”

Gina cracks a small smile at the memory, but she can’t help but feel upset about Carter. She knew this shouldn’t bother her, it’s just a guy. As her smile fades she checks her phone again and Ricky could tell she wasn’t happy.

“Well, I have to go take Tessa back home, so I’ll see you.” Ricky begins to turn to go find Tessa.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bore you.”

“Gina I get why you’re upset, the guys an asshole.” Ricky states bluntly.

“He really isn’t. He just is really busy.” Gina finds herself defending Carter but she doesn’t know why. It wasn’t like he was here in the dance studio with her and she had to make up for him treating her badly.

“Sure.” Ricky laughs.

As Gina packed her stuff and got ready to take the bus home, Ricky and Tessa were waiting for her at the front door. 

“Care for a ride?”

“How did you know?”

“I’m the only car left.” Ricky shrugs.

“Sure.” Gina says, it beat taking the bus.

The three of them walked to Ricky’s car, Ricky holding hands and swinging Tessa until they reached the car. The car ride was just Disney music and Tessa screaming along. It wasn’t awkward for them but they also didn’t know what to say to each other. Gina was picking at her nails, too nervous to check her phone for a text from Carter. She could feel rejection creeping up inside her. She caught him with his tongue down another girl’s throat, that clearly meant that he didn’t like her like that.

Ricky’s eyes looked over at Gina every few seconds, he looked at her hands and how damaged they were from the picking, pulling and biting. “Do you have any other plans today?” Ricky asks, trying to distract Gina from her thoughts.

“Not much, probably hang at my apartment. How about you?” Gina turns to look at Ricky.

“Once I drop off the little monkey over there, I was planning on meeting up with the boys and going to a bar.”

“That sounds fun.” Gina smiles and Ricky nods, his eyebrows rising.

“...You should join us.” Ricky suggests, while stopped at a red light which caused the two of them to look at each other.

“What? No...no I’m okay.”

“Gina, come on, it'll be fun. You’ve been so stressed about some guy the whole time I’ve known you. I’m taking you out so you can forget about him for a minute.” Ricky says with a smirk, and he pats Gina’s knee twice.

Gina’s eyes immediately looked at Ricky’s hand that was on her knee, he left it there for a few more moments before putting it back on the steering wheel. Maybe she deserved a night out.

Once Ricky dropped Tessa off at her house, he had to carry her inside because she fell asleep, he drove him and Gina to a bar that was close to Pepperdine’s campus. 

Once they arrived at the bar, Ricky held the door out for Gina. The place reminded her of the tv show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

“Bowie!” Gina heard a voice shout from the bar.

The two of them walked towards the bar, seeing a group of men in a corner booth eating some wings and drinking beer. One of the men with short dark brown hair and brown eyes walked towards the pair and wrapped Ricky up in a hug with a wide smile. Gina stands back letting the two of them have their moment and looks up at all the memorabilia on the walls.

“Guys, this is Gina.” Ricky introduces her to the rest of his teammates.

They all give some variation of a hello, and she notices a few of them are wearing their jerseys.

“These are the L.A. Dodgers?” Gina asks and Ricky nods, and the two of them head towards the bar.

“Yeah, they are awesome guys. Some came from a meet and greet hence why they are wearing their jerseys.”

When they arrive at the bar, Gina leans her elbow on it while Ricky grabs the attention of the bartender, who already knew who he was. It seemed like Gina was the only person who had no idea who Ricky was until two weeks ago.

“Hey Bowen, what do you want to drink tonight?” the bartender asks as he puts his rag on his shoulder.

“I’ll just have a Coors light in a can. What do you want to drink?” Ricky asks Gina.

“I’ll have a water please.” She answers and Ricky raises his eyebrow and tilts his head.

“Really?”

“Yes. It’s healthy and free, plus I don’t like drinking.” Gina protests so he doesn’t have to spend money on her.

Ricky just raises his eyebrow and Gina could feel her cheeks burning up.

“Fine...I’ll have a Coors Light.” Gina suggests wanting a simple drink and the bartender gives Ricky two beer cans.

Ricky put one on the bar as he opened the other with the bottom of his shirt and then handed it to Gina and then opened his. Once he put the beer caps on the bar he turned to face Gina and he flashed his signature smile and the lighting in the bar made his freckles more noticeable on his face.

“Cheers.” Ricky winks, as he taps his beer bottle against Gina’s and then takes a sip.

Gina follows his actions, and takes a sip. To her the beer was bitter and she couldn’t hide her disgust on her face. 

“This is awful.” Gina practically chugs the rest of it, trying to finish it so she wouldn’t have to have anymore. Ricky just laughs at her ations.

“Come on, it isn’t that bad.” He jokes as he takes another sip.

“Yes it is,” Gina retorts. “I’m going to hold it for the rest of the night just for conversations.”

As the night progressed, Gina had a lot more fun that she thought she would. She thought she would hate this and have to call Nini to come pick her up and use some lame excuse to go home, but she didn’t want to leave. Ricky was introducing her to his teammates and the bar was getting busier and everyone was nice.

When she finished a conversation with one of Ricky’s teammates she felt her mouth getting dry and her beer would only make it worse. She walks over to the bar and politely asks for a bottle of water.

As the bartender is grabbing her water, Gina stares at all of the bottles that are lined up around the bar. As she tries to read one of the titles she feels a tap on her shoulder. She expects it to be Ricky and so as she turns she has a big smile on her face, but when she sees who it is her smile starts to fade. Carter was at the bar of all places. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since the gala.

“Hey...” Carter smiled at Gina and she fakes a smile back.

“Hi.”

“I didn’t see you at the gala. Did you go?” He asks and Gina nods.

  
  


“Um, I actually skipped it, I had an assignment to work on.”

  
  


“Are you sure? Because your Instagram said you went.” Carter questions Gina and she could feel her face warming up.

“I was planning on it, but....”

“She was my date, right babe?” Ricky tells Carter with a smirk as he wraps his arm around Gina’s shoulder.

Gina was utterly confused and even though she wanted to speak, words were not forming.

“Yeah, I asked her to come but she wanted to stay home and study so we agreed on her attending for thirty minutes and then left. And we had her use your name on her post instead of mine so we wouldn't have to announce our relationship.” Ricky gloated to Carter and pressed a kiss to Gina’s red cheek.

Carter just bit his lip while glaring at the two of them and nodded.

“I didn’t know you two were a couple.” Carter said jealous evident in his speech.

“Well we wanted to keep it low key but I don’t want to lose someone like her.” Ricky said, hoping Carter would feel guilty for playing with Gina’s feelings.

After she heard Ricky say that, Gina started to play along with Ricky and she grabs his hand that was hanging on her shoulder.

“Thanks babe.” Gina says adding a silly giggle, a giggle she’s never made before but it worked for their act.

Ricky kisses Gina’s forehead a couple of times which made her giggle again and they let Carter watch them pretend to be in a relationship. Carter after drinking some of his beer shook his head, sick of watching Ricky and Gina.

“Well you guys make a great...couple. I’ll see you guys later.” Carter says with the fakest smile Ricky’s ever seen before walking through the crowd.

When Gina turned towards Ricky all she saw was him laughing and drinking his third beer.

“Why did you say that?” She asks and he shrugs in response.

“I think you mean you’re welcome.” Ricky winks and Gina rolls her eyes but laughs with him.

“Ricky you didn’t need to do that.”

“Yes I did, he needed to know what he’s missing. You deserve better than him, ballerina.”

“Thanks stud.”

The two of them just smile at each other and Ricky wraps his arm around Gina and brings her back to the table and they talk with the team and girlfriends about everything going on in the world. They talk about how the team is ready to go for the World Series. Gina was sitting next to Ricky and he still had his arm around her shoulder, she made jokes with him and he jokingly nudged her.

Even though the bar was loud, she was comfortable which was surprising, and she knew that if Ricky wasn’t with her this would be like the Gala again. Just after she thought that, the guys get up to play pool and Gina was sitting with the girlfriends, and she expected the friendly mood to disappear quickly.

“How long have you been seeing Ricky?”

“What?” Gina turns her head.

The girl giggles “I asked how long have you been seeing Ricky? He never talks about you.”

“That’s because we aren’t dating. We are just friends. We hit it off after he dropped Tessa off at my dance class.” Gina said and all the girlfriends and wives looked shocked.

Pause:

“You guys may be friends, but he definitely has a thing for you, and you two would be cute.” One of the girlfriends suggests and the rest of the girls nod in agreement.

“It’s okay, we’re just friends. He’s a nice guy though.” Gina says, getting rid of any idea of them dating.

The girls respected her statement and moved onto a different subject that Gina was following along to. They were nice girls, they were making sure to include her and have her contribute to their conversations. While Gina was laughing at something one of them said, she noticed Ricky walking towards the door. He was on his phone talking with furrowed eyebrows and an angry expression.

Gina excuses herself, leaving the booth and following Ricky outside.

When she heads outside, she hears Ricky’s voice sounding very mad and stressed.

“No...No, dad. I’m working on it. I’m playing more games this season.” Ricky sighs and looks up into the sky.

Gina stands by the door, trying to stay hidden and not look like she was listening to his conversation.

“Dad...I go to workouts and practice everyday, it’s not my fault I play the same position as Cody...I’m doing the best I can!” Ricky was trying to sound confident while defending himself against his dad.

Gina’s lips turned into a frown and she crossed her arms over her stomach. As she turns to head back inside, Ricky sees her and his face turns a shade of red, Gina’s never seen on him. He was embarrassed about getting into a fight in front of her and he wondered how much she heard.

“Dad. I gotta go. I’ll see you on Friday. Goodbye.” Ricky says and immediately hangs up the phone, not bothering to listen to his dad say goodbye.

Gina forces a grin and walks over to Ricky, her arms still crossed over her chest.

“I’m sorry, I saw you leave and just wanted to check in.”

“Yeah, I’m okay. My dad called me saying that my family is coming into town for my game against Houston...and yelling at me to get more playing time.”

“I’m so sorry, Ricky, but I thought you were playing more?”

“Yeah I am, and I’m so happy about that, and I love Cody but until I have the outfielder position locked up, my dad will never be happy. My mom is not in my life so she’s no help.” Ricky explains and Gina nods, trying to show Ricky that she understands.

“It’s okay, you’ll get there eventually.” Gina puts her hand on his shoulder and rubs it a few times in a comforting manner which causes Ricky to smile.

“Thanks. Hey you got enough money for rent right?”

“Yes, the money will be in the account soon! Bless little kids for loving dance.” Gina laughs.

“That’s good to hear, ballerina.” He grins and nudges Gina’s shoulder.

When Ricky looked at Gina, there was a softness in his eyes when he noticed how simply beautiful Gina looked under the streetlight. She was easy to get to know, which was reliving in a way. He never met a girl that wasn’t attracted to him, which made it hard for him to be himself with random girls, but even though he spent just the day with her, he felt like he’s known her forever.

“Here, why don’t I get you a drink.” Gina offers and grabs Ricky’s hand and brings him into the bar.

Ricky said this would be his last drink of the night, he didn’t want to show up to the game tomorrow hungover. Gina and Ricky sat by themselves, talking about anything and everything, until Ricky looked over at the pool table area.

“Want to play pool?”

“No, I’m so bad at pool.”

“I’ve had a few drinks, so I think you’ll be better than me.” Ricky jokes.

“How about darts?” Gina offers and Ricky bites his lower lip.

“You only want to see me fail at throwing and accidentally throw the dart in someone’s eye?” Ricky laughs.

“Is it that obvious?” Gina fake gasps and the two of them walk over to the dart board and split the darts between themselves.

They played two rounds, laughing and hyping each other up, but Gina had to wrap up the night, it was nearly midnight and she had dance and Ricky had baseball in the morning. After Ricky grabbed all the darts after his second loss, Gina jokes that she won two games.

“You’re good at baseball...I’m good at darts.” Gina laughs.

“Fine. How about one more game, but we spice things up.”

“How? We spin around three times and then close our eyes and throw the dart?”

“That sounds like fun, but no.”

They both laugh as Gina drinks the last of her water.

“How about a bet?”

Gina raises her eyebrow and gives a nervous laugh.

“What kind of bet?”

“Well..” Ricky walks closer to Gina but looks at the dart board. He opened his mouth like he was going to say something, but didn’t know how to word it.

“If you win, I come with Tessa and participate in your dance class. But, if i win...”

“Go on.”

“You come to the dinner my team is having on Friday and we pretend we are dating.”

Gina laughs, thinking Ricky was joking, but the look on Ricky’s face told her he was serious, and she quickly stops laughing.

“Ricky, Carter may have believed it, but do you really think your teammates would believe it?”

“Yes, ballerina, you are a smart and funny girl. It would only be for a night and it would distract from the fact I’m not a full-time player.” He tries to not sound desperate.

Gina looks at the ground. It would only be for a night and after listening to the phone call, she knew how important this would be to Ricky. It couldn’t hurt, it was only one night and Ricky was a nice guy.

“We don’t need to bet, I’ll do it.”

“Really?”

“Only...”

Ricky laughs, “what’s your end?”

“Only..if we keep making Carter think we are a couple until he asks me out for real.”

“Gina...” Ricky huffs.

“Please Ricky...I know you don’t like him, but I do and I really want him to realize what he’s missing.” She tells him and he narrows his eyes as if he’s thinking.

“...Fine.”

  
Ricky knew he would regret it later, but he didn’t want to fight with her. When he saw the twinkle in her eyes when he agreed, he knew in that moment he would have agreed to anything she asked of him.

“You are the best fake boyfriend in the world.” Gina teases, giving Ricky a wink and he nods.

“You’re an okay fake girlfriend...as of right now.” He said before throwing a dart at the dart board.

Gina pulls Ricky into a hug, putting her head on his shoulder. She really appreciated him doing this and she believed that this was the beginning of an amazing friendship. He smiled after they separated and then he threw another dart and Gina giggled as he missed the board for the millionth time.Ricky pursed his lips together, embarrassed that he was losing for the third time. 

**Author's Note:**

> this was my twitter au that i am continuing on here//enjoy and please let me know what you think


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